Darren Worts 24-hour Treadmill Marathon Raises $25,000

Darren Worts’ 24-hour treadmill marathon at The Chatham Club raised more than $25,000 for OneGift Inc., the Morristown-based non-profit dedicated to helping dreams come true for adult cancer survivors.

Darren Worts is a personal trainer at the Southern Boulevard gym who took to the treadmill at 10 a.m. Friday, and ran, paced and walked day and night until 10 a.m. the following morning. He celebrated with a champagne toast on completing marathon.

On Monday, OneGift co-Founder Anne DeLaney of Mendham said the money raised by the benefit surpassed her expectations.

“We’ve never done anything like this. It was amazing,” she said.

Worts logged in 119 miles during his overnight run. Throughout the night he was accompanied on his trek in the gym’s lobby by two runners, and not to mention dozens of supporters who came to urge him on.

Also joining him at various times were DeLaney and OneGift’s Terri Parise. Parise ran at the start of the marathon, while DeLaney joined him a few times, finishing the last hour with him on Saturday morning.

“I probably went 18 miles,” she said.

DeLaney said the money Worts raised will allow the group to grant more wishes, whether they be trips to Disneyland, as had been provided for one women, to flying family members in to see those too sick to travel. To date, she said, OneGift has made more than 3,500 wishes come true.

DeLaney and Leigh S. Porges founded in OneGift in 1988 in memory of their mothers, Ruth Ann DeLaney and Carol G. Simon.